Last Little Damo

"Relationships are not solidified when people meet, but when they end. Thanks for letting me be with you until the end." - Hwangbok Joon

"I missed you, Jae Hui." - Jae Mo

One can tell from the start that Damo is a tragedy - credits begin with our first image of Chae Ohk, the edges are sliced and the entire pictorial becomes skewed.

If you don't want to be spoiled for the end, don't watch this. It's a high def version of the end scene of the series. The subs are in French - because I couldn't find a high def version in English. This is Jae Hui and her brother Jae Mo.

Damo; An Attempt To Organize My Thoughts

mae hwa bat [A Grove Of Ja -

I just finished this drama and the tears are still streaming down my face as I listen to part of the official sound track to Damo: Adagio and A Song of Sorrow.

Damo was another of those Korean Dramas I thought would be important for me to watch like Stairway to Heaven, Winter Sonata and Full House. I was no where close to being as touched by any of those three dramas as I was with Damo. I’d been putting off watching for a while; I had read the summaries, the plot had a little of a disturbing twist that I think I was avoiding, but I decided last weekend to give it a go. It was only 14 episodes, after all.

Damo is the story of Jae Hui (played superbly by Ha Jin Won)– a seven year old girl whose nobleman father, after a government scandal, kills himself rather than be taken in by the royal guard. Jae Hui and her brother Jae Mo (played by Kim Min Joon) ride off together so they are not captured by the guards and taken away. This attempt is for naught, they are captured and cruelly separated.

Enter Hwangbok Yoon (played by Lee Seo Jin), teenage son of a nobleman and his mistress, he is shunned by a society that favors noble purebreds. Jae Hui becomes his slave girl, but as they grow a familial bond forms between the two that cannot be broken. Jae Hui is no longer called so by society, since she is a slave, her name becomes Chae Ohk, which aptly means a colorful marble.

Chae Ohk becomes a damo – a female police officer. Not quite what we in the west consider a female police officer, she is also still considered a servant girl, less than nothing, used as a female police officer when a woman dies so she can investigate where no men can go. This position is suitable to both Chae Ohk and Joon, she is able to serve him and he is able to keep an eye on her and keep her near.

As time goes on, we sense his confusion as Joon becomes aware of and begins to acknowledge deeper feelings for Ohk but because of his rank, he is unable to express them. We sense that Ohk may have feelings for Joon as well, but she will not give them any purchase because she is a slave and unworthy to even have thoughts of loving him. It is enough for her to think of him as family.

Chae Ohk goes undercover to infiltrate a gang of counterfeiters/ rebels in the mountains and meets the very charismatic Jang Sung Baek, leader of the rebels. As a part of the gang, Ohk begins to see that Sung Baek is not just a foul law breaker, but a leader of people who love him, who loves them back as a loving father would. She is drawn to Sung Baek and his mountain people – and begins to develop feelings for him.

She knows her duty, but her instinct will not allow her to kill him. Jang Sung Baek knows that Chae Ohk is a damo, knows she has infiltrated his camp, but his instinct will not allow him to kill her or give her up to his men.

We learn pretty early on that Jang Sung Baek is Chae Ohk’s brother and are a little creeped out that they are falling in love. While we are trying to cope with that, we watch as obsession begins to overtake Hwangbok Joon, as he gives in to his love for Chae Ohk and has to find her.

Watching the irony, as Chae Ohk pushes away Joon, saying she loved Hwangbok Joon as her brother, but drawing love nearer as a woman to her blood brother Jang Sung Baek.

Hwangbok Joon, laments throughout the series that he has never done one thing for Chae Ohk, all he now wants is to take her into the mountains to love her and care for her forever. Jang Sung Baek no longer wants to live the life of a rebel, wants to take Chae Ohk to the mountains; “I used to dream about the “good” life where I could hold a shovel instead of a sword, and till a field, and find a wife and raise a child. My "good" life is the treason and the conspiracy”.

I was pulled in every direction possible with this series. What was right? What was wrong? Characters manipulated by evil power hungry nobles, trapped in a cruel society that discriminated based on birth, based on perceived scandal, who fought to hide the love they felt for fear of disgracing themselves and their families.

In the end, I understood that Chae Ohk truly loved Joon as a man and the pull of love she felt toward Jang Sung Baek was the love of a sister for her brother – they had both confused the attraction of their blood for something more earthly.

There were so many moving moments I can barely enumerate them. The final scene at the beach, the scene at the cliffs, Joon cleaning Chae Ohk up and brushing her hair in the temple when she is in a coma, when Jang Sung Baek realizes he just missed Jae Hui in the temple and runs out to find her, but cannot.

I thought the ending was as it had to be. Hwangbok Joon was finally finally able to do something for his beloved Chae Ohk. Jang Sung Baek understood that his movement of the people would continue, that his steps simply forged the beginnings of a new road for those he loved. He as at last able to shed his pain and look upon his sister. I wept and wept the last 15 minutes of the series and for some time afterward, in fact, as I type now, I am still crying.

I will be haunted by those words, “I missed you Jae Hui.”

“A far off mountain, a mountain with a deep green forest.
A destiny that could not foresee that divide
A love I could not measure
A love that tore apart my heart
Not again, never again
Do not live for me”

War of Flowers/Tazza: Overall Impressions

“Hwatoo is like life…you can’t take back your move during a game even if it was a mistake. It teaches how painful a moment's mistake can be.” – Kim Goni

Hwa – Fighting Too – Flowers - “The War of Flower”

A tazza (according to character Pyung Jung Kyang) is someone who appreciates the art of manipulation through the game. A tazza appreciates it as elegance: "That's why there are so many cheaters and so few tazzas."

Hwatoo is a Korean card game (the cards are called go-dori). There’s flowers and numbers and months and all sorts of analogies to life through hwatoo. Not a good life though. Nope. Not one little bit.

I came in a Hwatoo virgin – not even knowing there had been a smash hit movie in 2006 or a series of manhwa (comics) from which the series had been based. I came in fresh and was entranced by the first episode. The cast was first rate, the chemistry was good, the energy level of each episode was high. The hour went by so quickly, I was surprised when it was over and couldn’t wait to watch the next.

Our main character is Kim Goni, played to perfection by Jang Hyuk. I simply cannot say enough about this man’s acting or his naked upper body. Both are absolutely thrilling; I could sit all day watching him do chin ups with the same enthusiasm as I could sit all day and watch him play in character. Any character. I just want to watch him emote. With no shirt on.

Sorry. No, not sorry. But if this is going to get written, I need to focus.

Goni and NanSook are in love, always have been. If you are ever confused over who truly loves who in a Korean drama, you have only to follow the pretty red thread back to the old necklace exchange when they are 11 years old (#55 on the list). It’s easy when you know how to read the signs.

Goni and Young Min (played by the very attractive and charismatic Kim Min Joon – third picture from the left) are best friends in high school. We know this after seeing them pull a con in a billiards hall together, run away, and gleefully jump off a bridge into the back of a garbage truck. Goni is fiercely loyal and would do anything for those he loves. Young Min seems a little proud, won’t take his share of the get from billiards, he’s a little stand offish.

Circumstances arrange themselves so that our friends become mortal enemies up against a slick backdrop of casinos, gambling dens, desperate addictions, and twisted passions. The series played on the success of one of the best buddy movies ever made - “The Sting” starring Robert Redford and the late Paul Newman. The plotting toward the end had a distinct “Ocean’s Eleven” flavor, though not as polished.

The series missed an opportunity there, I thought. There was tragedy, there had to be, but the end con could have been handled differently. The direction of the film was different, with a different message at the end, not one that glorifies gambling, not one that shoves the evil of addiction down your throat, but more about greed and it’s destruction.

The love affair between Goni and NanSook was lacking as well. We are meant to believe that it is genuine and powerful. For the most part, while it was sweet and endearing it lacked punch as our characters matured. Their first kiss, shared when in their twenties, was chaste and almost embarrassed. OK, I might buy that ~ this is Korean Drama afterall. But later on, our lovers should have poured a little bit of the desperation of their circumstances into subsequent meetings ~ I'm thinking specifically of when they meet after Goni escapes from the pen. If a hot Jang Hyuk, fresh out of prison risks discovery and an arm by forcing his way into my elevator, you can bet I'm going to be all over him like egg in a bowl of bibimbap. A naked egg in a hot HOT bowl of bibimbap.

But then THAT wouldn't be k-drama, would it?

Young Min throughout would appear to be driven by greed and power. I kept comparing Young Min to Yeom Moon in Emperor of the Sea. Another orphaned youth taken under an evil wing (amusingly enough, also played by Kim Kap Soo, Yeom's Moon's Master Yi in that series), Yeom Moon is fiercely loyal to his adoptive "father", desperately in love with the protagonist's woman Jung Hwa and smoking ruthless as played by the charismatic Song Il Guk. It was either the power of Song's performance or the gift of the writers that brought that dynamic to a weeping climax as the audience wanted Yeom Moon's redemption more than it wanted to see the hero Bogo win the day. And as much as I liked Young Min, I didn't get that same spine tingly feeling in the character.

I really enjoyed this series. There were some fine cons played with excellent twists. I bled with Jang Hyuk as he wrestled with his guilt and loss. I ached for Young Min each time he betrayed his friends, and kept hoping for his redemption. I delighted in all the side characters ~ and I enjoyed the bitch-play between Madam Jang (Kang Sung Yun) and Lee Nan Sook (Han Ye Seul).

Madam Jang by the way? Absolutely fabulous.

I’m irritated that this series didn’t get the recognition that it deserved. The acting was first rate and the storyline energetic. I haven’t been this enthusiastic in a while about a drama in some time and I think it deserved more kudos than it got.

Review will be up later.